Is It Only Men Who Are Discriminated Against in Divorce Cases?

This Hub was written in response to a HubPages forum thread, "Are men the only ones discriminated against during a divorce?"

Here's the question in its author's own words:

http://hubpages.com/forum/topic/69858

I don't know how many replies are on that forum thread, because I was apparently one of the first to see it.  This is a subject that is kind of a "cause" of mine.

One irony is often that the very men who would NEVER want to hurt their child by even trying to separate him from his mother are the ones who get the worst treatment.  The ones who think little of their wives or who get into "some kind of cognitive dissonance thing", or the ones who are just so angry they're out to hurt, are the ones who go with the "nuts" or "sluts" attack on the mother of their child.

Neither the laws nor lawyers who must work within them have a shred of regard for what's best for children (which is not to destroy one parent when children have two loving parents).

Having said that, I think men often give up too easily when remaining a non-custodial parent becomes the challenge that it does.  Some may not realize how important they are in their children's lives, and so they just kind of back away and think, "Oh well, the kids are with their mother, who loves them.  They're fine, I guess."  Some  fathers (let's face it) aren't very good at going the extra mile for anyone but themselves.  They may love their children, but it isn't particularly built into some men to go too far beyond what works for them.

Then, too, I think many may (like lawyers and everyone else do) just accept "This is how things are done."  I don't know how many try to fight it, try to sue over something that happens to them that is out-and-out a violation of their rights, etc.   In other words, I don't know how many men really know how to assert their parent rights and responsibilities as a non-custodial parent.  Sometimes the only thing some people (men or women) know is to try to fight for custody.

I agree that men are treated poorly, but they aren't the only ones who are discriminated against.

Divorce lawyers know that if there's nothing much an angry husband can bring up about the mother of of his children, there's always the "nuts" or "sluts" defense.  Since it's, I guess, more difficult to accuse a woman of the latter "matter", they go for the "nuts" approach.  It can start the day a woman leaves the home (often with her children), and (at least where I live) all it takes is a husband to convince a few relatives that he's "worried about her" and "what she'll do" to have the Department of Mental Health send out an ambulance.  If she won't go, the police arrive.

When she gets there "for an evaluation", there's no such thing as "Oh, let me explain this misunderstanding, and let me point out that this is why I needed to leave."  Instead, nobody owns up to the mistake of picking up a perfectly normal mother, and from there more and more mistreatment of her and her children can occur.  As the damage and violations build up, there's more and more reason for people not to want to believe it was 100% wrong to ever have the woman picked up.   Children are left with fathers they're not comfortable with, haven't been as close as they should have been, or in some cases fathers who are abusive to them.

By the time women who have had this kind of thing go on get to court, everybody already thinks she's nuts, or at least wonders if, "Ok, maybe she's obviously not insane, but there must be something a little off there; otherwise, none of this (garbage information/lies) would be in files they have on her."

I pretty much think that as a result of how things go on with women, if anyone looked at any number of "divorce court rooms" across the country, they'll see all the women who haven't had this happen; and all the men who are mistreated by the court system.  They'll also see cases where the mother "has mental issues", and where nobody questions that the father should get custody of the children.

What nobody would readily see is that x percent of those women who have been called, "nuts" or "a little on the nuts side", have been discriminated long before the matter ever got to court.  They're discriminated against when they say they want to leave a marriage, and a husband assumes they must be nuts to want to leave.  They're discriminated against when, even when they're in their 30's, 40's, or 50's relatives don't see how capable and competent they are, and instead see them as teenagers who are making a big mistake they'll later regret.  They're discriminated when friends or relatives who know nothing about what has been going on in a marriage, or for how long, believe they must be nuts if they want to leave a perfectly nice seeming man who has a good job, is well liked by them, doesn't drink, and is kind to the kids.

They're often discriminated against because a lot of people just don't see them as "on the ball" if they're mothers who chose to stay home when the children are little. If they get brought to a mental health facility, it isn't just a matter of how much sense they're obviously making when they explain, or whether they remain calm and collected.  Instead, what gets written into files are things like "stringy hair) (when the day she was picked up was a humid, rainy, day), or things like, "long, unmanicured, nails" (when a woman may have worked to keep her long nails attractive but didn't have the chance to add polish before she left her home in a hurry).

More importantly, women can be discriminated against simply by virtue of the fact that a whole lot of people are a whole lot more ready to believe what a man says, or respect a man who has a good job and drives a prestigious car; than they are to believe what any woman says (especially a woman who, like most women, is not mannish or matronly and is, instead, more the "nice, little, lady" kind of of woman.

Women can also be discriminated against when family or friends don't realize she's perfectly capable of supporting herself and her kids (whether or not they, personally, are not familiar with any well laid plans she has).  They're also discriminated against when people (in general) assume that "all women are just out to get a guy's money, so that's the real reason they want a divorce and custody of the children."

The bad treatment, lack of respect, lack of valuing, and discrimination against men is, in a lot of ways, "condensed" into something that primarily shows up most in the way men are treated in divorce courts.  The bad treatment, lack of respect, lack of valuing, and discrimination aimed at women is more spread out.  These are things that often surround a woman in her day-to-day life long before there's ever a divorce.  They're things that can seem to come out the blue the minute a woman tries to make her move out of a marriage. 

True, these aren't usually the things that show up in divorce courts when no one has gone with the "nuts" approach; but, again, the fact that these things aren't as obvious on the surface (or even in court records) doesn't mean there isn't a cancerous mistreatment of, and discrimination toward, women within the court system and outside of it.

Today, people have become more and more aware of how wrong it is that men have so often been so mistreated in divorce situations; so, as a result, whole groups and organizations have formed in an effort to get laws changed, to change how things are done, and to make the public more and more aware of all the gross mistreatment that men have often often had inflicted on them by laws and by the courts.  This is, of course, a good thing.  The trouble with it is, however, that the approach of so many people who are trying to make things right tends to be to encourage the awarding of custody more and more to fathers.  While many will argue that fathers can be great parents too (sometimes better than some mothers), and while this is, of course, true; this new push toward more "equal distribution of custody" disregards any belief that the mother/child bond is, in fact, one that is unique (when mothers are normal and loving) and important in a child's development.  (This is an argument for another day.  The point is that pushing for more equal mistreatment of women in divorce cases isn't the healthiest thing for families or society either.  What's worse, when this "equal mistreatment" does occur, it often occurs after a woman has already been severely mistreated, disregarded, and discriminated in any number of ways (and by any number of people within, or outside of, The System.)

Fixing the disasters that courts create in individual's and families' lives shouldn't be approached by simply finding ways to do more of the same absolutely ignorant, and often criminal, things when people have no choice but to have divorces processed through a system that is destructive to both individuals and families (and that, by the way, often ends up costing a whole lot more tax dollars, one way or another, in ways too few people even see).  Fixing the disasters that courts inflict on individuals and families isn't going to be done by telling "everyone" to seek the counseling services of people who are "used to dealing with this kind of thing" but who have no power (and sometimes no reason) to change court orders.   Fixing things isn't going to be done by lawmakers who all too often believe they know everything they know about the causes of problems in families and society (and those causes are never about the laws they and their cronies voted for.  Neither is fixing things going to happen if voters are only interested in laws/programs that focus on only the needs of children, without regard for the one important fact that needs of children are best met when courts don't destroy one or both parents.

The reality is that men are discriminated against in a whole lot ways, and women are often discriminated against in a lot of other ways.  As for children, well, I guess the court systems are happy to operate on the "it-takes-a-village" kind of thinking, once they have rendered one or both parents incapable of providing financial and/or emotional support to their own children.